Wednesdays with… Micaela!

Hungarian-ish skillet-roasted pork, two ways

Less than 24 hours after I met my future mother-in-law, I sat down at her kitchen table and spent most of the day helping her prepare food for her second son’s 30th birthday party. This proved to be a great, low-pressure way for us to get to know one another without the usual awkwardness. No matter what else is going on in our relationship or our lives, she and I can always talk for hours about food. About two years after we met, she called one day and during our conversation I confessed that new motherhood and sleep-deprivation had left me particularly uninspired and unmotivated to cook dinner that day. So she shared the following recipe she got from a Hungarian neighbor, which she’d cooked many times for friends & family, and I definitely consider it the best gift she’s ever given me. From the moment I first made it, we all knew it was a keeper. If my sons ask what’s for dinner and I answer “Grandma’s pork roast”, a round of cheers can be heard across the land. The best part about is that it is ridiculously easy, so it is weeknight-friendly but also company-worthy!

My little secret is that as much as we all love the roast, the best part is that I can usually get 2 – 3 meals out of it by making an easy rice & pork dish with the leftovers. In many poor countries, you’ll find people using a little meat and mixing it with rice in order to make it go further, feed more hungry mouths – arroz con pollo and Indian biryanis are perfect examples of this. In Puerto Rico, we make delicious rice dishes with just about any meat you can find, and I’ve made my fair share of arroz con dishes… make a little sofrito, add a little tomato sauce and a dash of turmeric (which is less expensive than saffron), throw in a pound or two of cut up meat, and voilá! That was my inspiration for this and we all look forward to having this “leftover” rice dish, so much so that my husband has learned not to use up all the sauce on the first night of the roast (usually he bathes his starches in any pan sauce there is to be had) just so I have it for cooking the rice.

Wednesdays with… Micaela!

Print Recipe

Ingredients

For the Skillet-Roasted Pork

• 3 ½ – 6lbs pork loin roast
• 8 Tbsp butter 1 stick, I use salted
• salt & pepper to taste
• enough sweet paprika & [dry rubbed] sage to coat your roast

For the Arroz con Cerdo

• 1 ½ – 2lbs pork roast diced
• leftover pan sauce at least 1 cup
• 6 ½ cups of water
• 4 cups Jasmine rice
• salt & pepper to taste

Instructions

For the Skillet-Roasted Pork

• Use a braiser or a Dutch/French oven large enough to fit the roast to cook this in.
• After you pat dry the meat with paper towels, season with salt & pepper to taste, then coat it with paprika and sage while you're melting the butter – I took a picture because I wanted to make sure y'all knew I was serious about coating, not sprinkling -- the roast.
• You'll know the butter is ready when it's not only melted but starts smelling nutty; don't let it burn though. Brown/sear the roast on both sides on Med-High (as soon as it hits the pan and the paprika and sage start to sizzle, you'll probably swoon a little from the deliciousness of the smell. But maybe that's just me), making sure to move the roast around so the sauce doesn't burn.
• Lower the temperature to Med-Low and cover.
• Cook for 30 minutes on each side until the internal temperature in the center of the roast reaches 145-155* using an instant-read thermometer. Remove roast from pan and allow to rest 10-15 minutes. Slice diagonally in ½ inch-thick slices. I suggest you serve this with a nice starch that will absorb the sauce, like baked or mashed potatoes, or white rice, and seasonal vegetables.

For the Arroz con Cerdo

• Dice up at least 1 1/2lbs of leftover roast, simmer it a few minutes in leftover pan sauce (which has all that delicious butter, paprika and sage!), then add the water, rice, and salt & pepper, bring to a boil, stir.
• Lower heat to Med-Low, cover and cook 20 minutes.
• Add in frozen peas if you'd like – I usually don't add them but the pictures would've been terrible without a little pop of color. (I like it with the peas but my guys prefer it without.)

Notes

Note: my mother-in-law makes this roast with thyme, not sage. While delicious that way, one day I ran out of thyme (ha!) so I used sage instead, and WOW, that was it... the sage really took it to another level for me. Feel free to try it with either herb and please let us know what you think! You can also sub in 4 tablespoons of olive oil for an equal amount of butter and it will still taste delicious.